A college graduate paying more than $1,000 per month on student loans recently wrote that he had been told “to chase down a bachelor’s degree by any means necessary.” But, he added, “no one mentions just how expensive and soul-crushing the debt will be.”

Our country has most of the best colleges in the world. We also have the most graduates paying off college debt. Roughly 40 million borrowers owe $1.5 trillion in student loan debt.

The questions I hear most often about college are: “Can I afford it? Is it worth it? Can you make it simpler to apply for financial aid and pay back loans?” Administrators have a specific question: “Can you do something about the jungle of red tape that wastes money on overhead that could instead be spent on students?”

First, reduce to about two dozen from 108 the number of questions on the form 20 million families fill out every year to apply for federal student financial aid. Eliminating this unnecessary complexity is the best way to help more low-income students attend college. The number of applicants for student aid would go up by about two million a year, according to Kim Cook of the National College Access Network. The former president of Southwest Community College in Memphis told me he loses 1,500 students each semester who are discouraged by the chilling maze of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid form. This simplification also would help avoid $6 billion in mistakes that affect taxpayers, according to the Education Department.

Just as we must make it easier to apply for a student loan, we must also make it easier to pay back a student loan. Professor Susan Dynarski at the University of Michigan calls the nine different ways of repaying student loans “a rigid, archaic payment system that unnecessarily plunges millions into financial distress.” One Tennessee college president told me it took him nine months to figure out how to help his daughter pay off all her loans, even with the money in hand.

A borrower might have to choose among five different Income Based Repayment options or standard, extended or graduated variations of monthly payments, or be faced with a period of no earned income — all of which could produce different requirements for borrower eligibility, different calculations on monthly or annual payments and different amounts of time in which to pay back the loan.

My second proposal is to replace this complicated student loan repayment system with two options, both with monthly payments deducted from an employees’ paycheck. The repayment option I believe most students will choose would never require paying more than 10 percent of the borrower’s discretionary income — the portion not needed for necessities.

For example, Joe is unmarried with no children. He earns a bachelor’s degree in engineering. He owes the average loan for a college graduate, $28,500. His starting salary is $60,000, the median for an engineering degree, according to the Census Bureau. So each year, we deduct the portion of Joe’s income needed for necessities, $18,735. Joe pays 10 percent of that discretionary income, $41,265, which is $4,127 a year or $343 a month. At this rate, even if Joe never gets a raise, he pays off his loan in nine years. If he loses his job or earns less, he pays less or even pays nothing — and his inability to pay does not reflect on his credit rating.

The other repayment option would be a standard 10-year repayment plan, with equal monthly payments, like a mortgage. Under either one of these options, taxpayers will be made whole and borrowers should not have nightmares about repaying student loans.

My third proposal is a new accountability system for college programs based upon whether students are actually repaying their loans. If too many students aren’t repaying, then that program could lose its ability to enroll students with federal financial aid. Colleges would have new authority to counsel students about borrowing too much. This would give colleges “skin in the game” and encourage lower tuition and less borrowing in some programs.

It is never easy to pay for college, but the current level of generosity toward students is unprecedented. Last year, federal taxpayers awarded 60 percent of our 20 million college students $28 billion in grants and $90 billion in loans. In 16 states, two years of college is tuition free. While total student debt is high, the average loan for a four-year college graduate is about the same as the average car loan.

I am working with Senator Patty Murray of Washington, the senior Democrat on the Senate’s education committee, to complete work on these and other bipartisan proposals during the next six months. The next time a student asks “Can I afford it? Is it worth it? Can you make it simpler to apply for aid and pay back loans?” I want to be able to answer yes.

Senator Lamar Alexander, Republican of Tennessee, is the chairman of the Senate’s education committee and was secretary of education and president of the University of Tennessee.